Morning Thanks

Garrison Keillor once said we'd all be better off if we all started the day by giving thanks for just one thing. I'll try.

Saturday, December 08, 2012

Traveling Mercies

I'm not unaccustomed to traveling, but yesterday, like a thousand times before, I came up on a huge strip of truck tire, something peeled from 18-wheeler, black as coal, big as a forty-year old Florida gator. And I couldn't help but think about actually driving right behind some behemoth with a belly full of hogs and have that Mack kick up a beastly chunk of tire right in front of me. If it didn't take your life, it'd lay you up for awhile, or the car you were driving, and meanwhile scare the bejeebees out of you. A couple days ago, a friend told me there were eight dead deer along the highway just east of our place in a section of road no more than ten miles long. They're in the rut now, I think--I don't know any of them personally--and it's hunting season, the corn's long gone, and it's all very confusing, I'm sure. Eight dead in ten miles, and a whole lot of scarred vehicles and scared drivers.I spent two and a half hours feeling like a sausage yesterday, packed into a seat built for a girl scout and floating high above the firmament in an old jet somehow built exclusively for the exact number of passengers who wanted to leave Omaha and arrive in Houston by three. Talk about benawd (that's Dutch, sort of, for claustrophobic). But not until we were high over Houston, catching some wild winds from the gulf, did I even think about the fact that the friendly skies aren't always friendly. Flying as often as I do--and there are legions of folks who fly more--I simply forget that we are thousands of feet up above a crash landing. You walk up a gangway, take a ridiculously small seat, strap yourself in, listen to someone explain oxygen bags, pull out a book or nod off, and--voila!--you're in Houston.It may well be a sign of my old age to think dire thoughts while winging my way toward some distant location, but yesterday, more than once, I thought about not getting there. At a rest stop on Interstate 29, I spotted a semi loaded with squished cars wrapped in plastic (I'm not making this up) and stacked on a flatbed. One of the specimens seemed dangerously like a leaner. Sheesh. Imagine riding along with an ex-car slips off the back of the miserable truck in front of you.Oh, to be young and fearless.Reminds me of ye olde cliche from my father's prayers--"and grant them traveling mercies." I never knew exactly what "traveling mercies" meant, but I was sure it referred, at least, to gas station bathrooms and their relative state of health. But it was more, too--it was a prayer for the people who load those humongous bales of hay on the backs of Peterbilts, a prayer for taut ropes and wires and everlasting bungee cords. It was for deer to stay in the ditches or the woods, and for drivers who fought and fought and fought and somehow stayed joyfully ahead of the Sandman. And no DUIs.It was a handy term to toss out in a prayer because it covered the whole landscape of dangers, a cliche, a coverall, a tent, muslin enough to spread over an interstate or the canopy of half a continent. Anyway, this morning, here in Houston, I happy to say I got'em yesterday--traveling mercies, that is. And for that, this morning in Texas, I'm thankful.

Strap in and voila you're in Texas ...? Glad it seemed so easy for you! I'm an airline captain and can assure you there's more to it than that! Rest assured we always work to ensure your safe arrival. That's the basis of the system. The skies are beautiful but like all God's creation, they occasionally can get a little cranky! Some bumps are unavoidable. Glad to have people asking for the good Lord's blessing on their flight though. Can't hurt, I figure. Enjoy your blog. Keep up the good work!

“For some of us at least, to be a Calvinist today also means that we will have to work at keeping alive the memories of older sayings and teachings in the hope that there will soon come a day when many others will want to learn such things again.”